Telephone lines, which are carried by electrical conductors known as tip ring wire pairs, are generally aggregated at a particular point in a building prior to being distributed and connected to various types of telephone equipment, such as, for example, telephones, fax machines, modems etc. As the tip ring pairs generally enter the building as part of a multi-conductor cable, the individual tip ring wire pairs must first be broken out from the cable into individual wire pairs. This is normally accomplished in a junction box known as, for example, a building entrance protector (BEP), or network interface unit (NIU). Within such devices the individual telephone line tip ring pairs are separated from the cable, individually connected to a connector block, and made available for further electrical connection and distribution. Usually there is a protector device inserted between the telephone and central office, or network side of the telephone line and the customer equipment or terminal side of the telephone line to protect the telephone and user, or other equipment connected to the telephone line, from hazardous overvoltages induced in the telephone network or in the cables passing between the telephone central office and the building within which the line is terminated.
In a typical arrangement, the telephone lines coming from the network are first wired to a protector field, which is an array of connectors for receiving the protector device, which is in turn hard wired to a first connector block which provides a first test point for testing the telephone line connections between the building and telephone central office. This first terminal block is hard wired to a multi pair connector, most typically a twenty-five pair connector of the RJ21 type, for further connection to an array of customer bridges which are also hard wired and connectorized via a mating RJ21 connector. The use of a customer bridge permits a subscriber to disconnect terminal equipment from a telephone line so that the subscriber can isolate troubles on the line as originating in the telephone network, or on the terminal equipment side of the telephone line.
Additionally, there are known insulation displacement connector (IDC) blocks for use in such junction boxes and/or distribution fields, such as the ubiquitous punch down connector block, also known as a 66-type connector block, and the tool-less insulation displacement connector blocks utilizing push cap connectors, such as that described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,913,659 dated Apr. 3, 1990, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference. Such a connector block is commercially available under the product designation SC99 from Lucent Technologies Inc. Other connectors used for telephony wiring applications are described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,662,699 to Vachhani et al., dated May 5, 1987, and in U.S. Pat. No. 3,611,264 to Ellis, dated Oct. 5, 1971. Also widely available are tool-less IDC's known as Mini-Rocker Connectors such as those sold by A. C. Egerton Ltd., which hold a tip-ring wire pair in terminals retained under a signal movable cap through which both wires of the pair are inserted.
The cap section and base section of mini-rocker tool-less IDC connectors are held together by a latching mechanism known in the art. In order to achieve good latching performance, a significant amount of movement and deflection of the latch is required. This movement is facilitated by a living hinge. While this prior art IDC works for its intended purpose, a significant drawback to this prior art IDC is that with the passage of time and the effects of changes in temperature and pressure, the living hinges tend to lose their elastic properties. Thus, connectors with these prior art latches have to be manually hooked into position by the installer. This makes the latching mechanism unreliable because the installer may forget to complete the manual hook-up of the latch, causing early and unwanted disengagement of the cap from the base, permitting installed wires to disconnect.